


in this last of meeting places

by LlamasInDisguise



Category: The Pacific (TV)
Genre: Gen, Kinda, M/M, Not Canon Compliant, Possibly Pre-Slash, Post-War, Random & Short, The train scene
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-21
Updated: 2021-02-21
Packaged: 2021-03-19 01:28:48
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,493
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29618514
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/LlamasInDisguise/pseuds/LlamasInDisguise
Summary: Everything ends, Snafu knows this. Even the damn war had an end. And so, like everything else, their time in China comes to an end. Six months, come and gone just like that.
Relationships: Merriell "Snafu" Shelton & Eugene Sledge, Merriell "Snafu" Shelton/Eugene Sledge
Kudos: 10





	in this last of meeting places

The war ends like this for them, not with a bang but a whimper.  
  
A bang somewhere, sure. Snafu figures that for the people in Japan it ended with a hell of a bang. But then he thinks about that he thinks about all those Okinawan women and children, and how many of those Japanese back in their own country were women and children, and how many of them must be dead now. And that makes something twist in his stomach, something sharp and unpleasant that he doesn't know how to put a name to, and he doesn't want to feel bad for them--not after the years of shit he's been through, not after the bloody war that they just finished fighting in.  
  
But he knows what child sized corpses look like, blown to bits and half buried in mud. He's seen women ripped apart by mortars. He's passed by pieces of humans, strewn across the stinking ground like debris. He's seen what humans do to other humans all because someone decided that they were right and the others wrong.  
  
If he was a better man he'd probably try and change it, try to do some good in the world, but instead when he sees mud covered bodies he just looks away. Most of the time he's just thankful that it isn't him.  
  
He doesnt like thinking about it, some big fucking bomb that America dropped in a nation in the name of peace, because when he does it makes him feel guilty. It makes him feel guilty for it all, and then he feels guilty about feeling guilty, and then it makes him fucking mad.  
  
So he doesn't think about it. He's gotten pretty good at not thinking about things.  
  
He doesn't think about the end of the war. It's been two, almost three years since he left home, although sometimes it feels like a lifetime. Although, home isn't really the word he'd use for what he left behind. He doesnt think about how he'll see it again, soon. He doesn't think about how when their time in China ends, his time as a marine ends. They'll all go home, then, packed into train cars and shipped back to wherever the hell they came from; New York and Texas and Louisiana….and Alabama.  
  
After that, nothing.  
  
Or, well, as good as nothing.  
  
So he tries not to think of that. Tries not to think, at all. He eats and sleeps and does the mind numbingly boring patrols that the CO orders them to do, and when they have time off he drinks and gambles with the rest of the men.  
  
At night, he and Eugene sit and share a smoke, him with his lucky strikes and Eugene with that stupid fucking pipe. They sit in silence, mostly, and he sits right up next to Eugene, shoulders and thighs touching. Too close, really, but there's never anyone around to see, and even if there were he'd sneer and dare them to say something. He'll never admit it, least of all to Eugene, but watching him pack and smoke that stupid pipe has become as comforting for him to watch as he knows it is for Eugene. If he can smell that pipe, that tobacco burning, and see Eugene puffing away on it like some fucking posh old man. He knows that Gene's all right, that he's safe, sitting right there beside Snafu, having a smoke.  
  
He knows that he hasn't lost him yet.  
  
Which he will, of course, because he's never had a single good thing in his life before, but he knows that for people like him good things never last. Good things can't last. And Eugene? Eugene's the best thing that ever happened to him, the only good thing he's ever had.  
  
That's how Snafu knows he'll lose him, just like he loses everything.  
  
If he lets himself think about that it'll make him angry, because he learned from a young age that it's better to be angry than sad. Right now he doesn't want the anger; he's been angry his whole life. He just wants to give it a rest for a little bit, to sit and have a smoke with one of the only people he's ever actually wanted to keep in his life, to enjoy the fact that even though they fought through a whole fucking war they're still here, they're still alive. Even though he didn't plan on it, when he watches Eugene take a pull on the pipe or when the early morning sun lights his hair up as red as a Jap flag, he finds himself thankful for being alive. Making it through the war doesn't seem so bad when he's got Eugene by his side.  
  
Everything ends, Snafu knows this. Even the damn war had an end. And so, like everything else, their time in China comes to an end. Six months, come and gone just like that. The past years had dragged on for so long, the war and what came after, so much waiting for all the shit to be over, and now that it is over Snafu feels as if he's missed it all. All that time, slipping through his fingers like sand on the beaches of Pavuvu.  
  
_Where'd all the time go?_ He thinks in California, on a train bound for the east, watching one of the best friends he's ever had climb off the train in Texas. Snafu watches Burgie hug his little brother, his father, and feels an ache in his chest.  
  
Across the table Eugene sits, hair glinting copper and gold in the sunlight coming in through the window. Snafu watches him until their eyes meet and he looks away.  
  
Texas isn't all that far from Louisiana, after all.  
  
Where did all that time go.  
  
"Strange, isn't it," Eugene says, voice sounding somber.  
  
Snafu humours him. "What is?"  
  
"This. Just...being back in the states, after everything we saw." Eugene shakes his head. "Just hard to think that it's actually over."  
  
As Snafu opens his mouth he feels something like the biggest hypocrite in the world.  
  
"Everything gotta end, Sledgehammer. Better just get used to it. Nothing lasts forever."  
  
Eugene is silent for a moment.  
  
"No," he says, at last. "Nothing lasts forever."  
  
Snafu sits there and thinks _no matter how much I wish it did._  
  
And so, like all things must, time goes on. The train pulls out of Texas, and before Snafu really knows it, before he’s ready—but god, how can he ever be ready?—they’re rolling into Louisiana. It’s nowhere he knows, but somehow he can recognize the only state he’s ever called home. He watches out the window, countryside passing in blurs of green and golds and browns, and marvels at the lush foliage after the dry fields they’d left behind in Texas. Maybe, he’ll admit to himself, he just spends so much time staring out the window so he doesn't have to look at Eugene, dozing in and out of sleep, all soft and clean and comfortable like he hasn’t been in all the time Snafu’s known him.  
  
It’s dark, somewhere between too late and too early, and he’s watching the soft rise and fall of Eugene’s chest when the train finally rumbles into New Orleans.  
  
There’s something inside Snafu’s chest, something that feels like it should be roaring, but when he stands up and shoulders his bag the sound it makes is more like a whimper.  
  
Everything’s gotta end.  
  
Maybe, if he was a braver man he’d wake Gene up and clap him on the back. A handshake, maybe. A hug, if he were truly daring. _Hey_ , he’d say _it was nice knowing you_. Nice serving with you. I’m so happy to have known you. I’m glad you didn’t die like all the other men I knew.  
  
_I think I might have loved you._  
  
But Snafu knows that somewhere deep down on the inside, despite the war and the things he’s seen, the things he’s done and seen others do, he’s still just a goddamn coward with something breaking in his chest. And Gene looks so peaceful like that, sleeping so damn soundly, and Snafu knows how rare a good night’s rest is. He knows what kind of nightmares can climb into a man’s head and hang around for far too long, even when the real threat has gone.  
  
If Snafu was a better man he’d wake him up and tell him how much he’s gonna miss him. But he knows what kind of man he is, and it isn’t that.  
  
As he leaves he pauses, but only for a brief moment. He almost reconsiders, but doesn’t turn around, and leaves the train in the same way he leaves Eugene’s life: quietly, and without fanfare. Everything ends, and he’d rather it end on a clean break than a messy one. Not with a bang, he thinks, but a whimper.

**Author's Note:**

> i've never written for this fandom before (or, well, at least haven't written anything that i've publicly shared) so i dunno what this really is, or how it is. probably totally ooc. if you read this than hey, thanks for checking out my fic. 
> 
> the title and a few of the lines are shamelessly borrowed/bastardized from t.s. eliot's "the hollow men"


End file.
